Alex Norris: Ms Ryan, this is the first time I have served under your chairship and it is a pleasure to do so.
In this morning’s sitting we had a long and interesting discussion on amendment 5. It was a shame we could not reach consensus. We ended up having a conversation about whether what the amendment said was already in the Bill and it became an almost semantic conversation about whether “a local authority” is the same as “any local authority”. That is what will happen when something is gone through line-by-line, and it is important that we get to that level, but it was a shame we were not able to establish consensus.
With new clause 1 we have basically the same principle, but grown out. We now know for a fact that “a local authority” falls once we get to the boundaries of England, but we also know that the need for refuges does not drop off that cliff as we meet that border.
We also spent a lot of this morning talking about not wanting to put up barriers. Our job is to remove whatever barriers there are to the survivor leaving that situation. Whether the barrier is money, housing, family or whatever, we should seek to remove it so that they can make that best decision for themselves. This is a pretty big barrier: it is a border. I almost hesitate to say that because we talk too much about borders, especially in the context of Northern Ireland, but mercifully we are not going in that direction today.
Nevertheless, we will clearly have to do something. As my hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby said very eloquently, the need will be the same around border towns, but the facilities will be different. In a big city such as Nottingham, we might have things that they do not have in small border towns. From the perspective of people going from Scotland or from Wales to England, I should like to think that we would be there for them if that was best for them. I am sure that everybody would share that thought.
We have to be mindful of devolution and the devolution settlement, but it seems sensible, and to behove us, to accept the clause because it will give us a proportionate way of looking at how to get to something sensible. I suspect that it will be said that there are different arrangements in these countries. I am perfectly willing to accept that; nevertheless, how the arrangements marry up with our own is really important. It is important for English survivors, but it is also important for survivors in those nations.
I do not want to rehash everything from this morning, but I thought it regrettable that we did not push forward on the question of training in amendment 1. This is exactly the sort of situation that will be very complicated for a housing officer. We ask housing officers to understand an awful lot of things about an awful lot of different needs, and this is yet another one. We need them to understand that, if they are talking about people moving to different communities, that will need to be in England. We would not want people to be advised that their secure tenancy will apply somewhere else if those are not arrangements that we have been able to secure. I do not think that that is asking for much, but it will  certainly give us more confidence that down the line we will get to a point where we will have stitched-up nationwide look at the issue laid before Parliament, which would be desirable.

Melanie Onn: Yes—yes please to the sharing of information that has been distributed by Lord Bourne. I very much welcome that, as I would a notification to confirm that the meeting of 19 April has taken place and the detail of the conversations that took place within it. I am slightly concerned that the legislation is almost being drafted with eyes shut to the reality of people’s lives. I would urge every consideration to ensure that that is not the reality.
For example, I do not know whether the concordat or memorandum of understanding would be legally binding, how it would operate in an enforceable way and how, if an individual felt that they were being treated differently because they happened to cross a nation’s border, how they would go about challenging that, what the normal process would be, whether legal aid would be available, and so on.
There are still concerns that the legislation will not fully do what is necessary to meet the intention that has been set out, but I await the outcome of the meeting on 19 April. I agree that there should be a pause to establish  whether that meeting can resolve this issue in an amicable fashion, rather that something that seems to have a UK parliamentary overbearing overtone, which may not be well received by the devolved nations, and I mentioned the sensitivities of the issue in my speech. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the clause.